Oxbridge Conference Opens the Doors to the Prestigious Universities

Selecting their chosen university is one of the hardest decisions that many of our students have to make. Over 400 students went on to higher education last year and the prestigious Russell Group institutions are always popular choices, with Sixth Form College graduates from 2015  now studying at 14 of the 24 universities.

Oxford and Cambridge are often the cream that rises to the top of that list, and as part of our specialist support, a group of first year Honours Programme students were taken to Aintree Racecourse by their Personal & Guidance Tutors for a day of presentations and insight from the Oxbridge pair to help them make the most informed decision for their futures.

For some students, applying to either one of the most famous universities in the UK, that are synonymous with being at the forefront of academic achievement and celebration, has been a distant thought. Attending the conference, however, has made the prospect more than just a passing notion and turned it into a definite goal.

Economics, Government & Politics, History and Statistics student, Samuel Pelan, said: “Learning how to make your application was fantastically useful but the course-specific presentations really sold me. I was fairly sure I was going to apply to Oxford and I was fairly certain it was going to be for Politics, Philosophy & Economics (PPE), but this completely made up my mind.”

Samuel, who joined the college after being home tutored previously, continued: “I wasn’t too keen on the philosophy side beforehand, but after the presentation I was just hooked. They explained about all the modules which all sounded so interesting – political philosophy, metaphysics – it all sounded brilliant.”

On course for straight As in his AS Level exams this summer, Samuel concluded: “You can tell that it’s a different level in both universities - the way the students act and the way they speak. There’s no doubt that I’m applying for Oxford now; 100%. It’d be the best thing in the world to get to go there.”

Fellow first year, Bradley Bayley, also had an eye-opening experience, explaining: “The guys giving the talks seemed really good fun and made the presentations entertaining. They explained about the systems around the colleges as well, which seemed really interesting and pretty different to other places. They have ways of helping each other, like a ‘mother and father’ scheme with ‘children’ in the year below and ‘grandchildren’ in first year; it sounded quite funny but it’s clearly a great support system!”

Bradley, who studies Geography, ICT, Maths and Physics and is also set for the top grades come summer, appreciated the level of prestige which comes hand-in-hand with becoming Oxbridge alumni and said that the conference helped him decipher which direction he wanted his learning to take:

“I was thinking about doing Maths or Physics but now I’m swaying towards engineering, whether electrical or standard. From the presentations and the prospectuses I read, the courses on offer seem to be exactly what I’d want to do. It’s a close run, but I think Cambridge offers more of what I want to do so I’m leaning towards there.”